I'm both a tech journalist and an Internet safety advocate. Here's my full bio. I serve as
on-air technology analyst for CBS News and am co-director of ConnectSafely.org and founder of SafeKids.com and SafeTeens.com. I also write columns that appear on CNET News, Forbes.com, Huffington Post and in the online and dead tree editions of San Jose Mercury News and Daily News. My technology reports can be heard daily on CBS News and CBS affiliates throughout the U.S. and daily on KCBS radio in San Francisco. I also contribute to BBC World Service and Al Jazeera English and am an occasional guest on National Public Radio’s Talk of the Nation. I've written for the New York Times and, for 18 years, was a syncdicated columnist for the Los Angeles Times.

Does Facebook Pose a Threat to the Automobile?

Bob's Big Boy Drive-In was a major youth hangout (image from BigBoy.com)

I got my driver’s license the day I turned 16 and spent much of the rest of my youth behind the wheel, cruising Hollywood Blvd and munching burgers at Bob’s Big Boy Drive-In on Van Nuys Blvd. My friends and I even watched movies in our cars — at the local drive-in theater.

Times have changed. My son didn’t bother to get his license till he went off to college and only because he actually needed to drive. And, according to recent research from the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute in Ann Arbor, “a higher proportion of internet users was associated with a lower licensure rate.” The finding, according to the Institute “is consistent with the hypothesis that access to virtual contact reduces the need for actual contact among young people.” According to the Associated Press, “About 69 percent of 17-year-olds had a driver’s license in 1983″ compared to 50% in 2008. Even among young adults 20-24, the rate dropped from nearly 92% in 1983 to 82% in 2008.

No wonder General Motors turned turned to a division of MTV to get advice on how to sell cars to young people, Ross Martin, a 37-year old of MTV Scratch, told the New York Times, “They think of a car as a giant bummer.” The Times cites the National Highway Administration statistic that “drivers ages 21 to 30 drove 12 percent fewer miles in 2009 than they did in 1995.”

Fewer miles per year

Vehicle-Miles Traveled Per Capita Peaked in 2004 (Source: Calpirg)

A new report from Calpirg found that in 2011, the average American was driving 6 percent fewer miles per year than in 2004 but that among young people (16-34) the drop was an astounding 23% from an average of 10,300 miles to 7,900 miles per person.

A lot has changed since the days of my youth but the most startling change is the onslaught of social media. Even before Facebook and MySpace, my kids were using AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) to maintain a steady online conversation with their friends. Today, it’s common to keep up with friends near and far via Facebook or to share quick tidbits via Twitter.

Even Google and Wikipedia may be having an impact on driving. Back when I was in high school and even graduate school I would drive to the library to look things up. Today students can “Google” facts, look them up in Wikipedia or — hopefully — access original source material including online journals. We don’t even need to drive to the bookstore to buy our books — we download e-books to read on Kindles, iPads or even smart phones. The same can be said for visiting record stores. I used to drive my car to Wallach’s Music City in Hollywood or the House of Sight and Sound in Van Nuys to check out the latest music. Now all that happens online.

People still hanging-out

I’m not suggesting that social media has killed in-person togetherness. People still hang out, go to dinner and take in movies. Just walk around any big city on a weekend night and you’ll see plenty of young people hanging out and chances are they went online to arrange their get together, buy their tickets and make their dinner reservations. What you won’t see, however, are people cruising around in cars. You will see people on bikes and plenty of people walking and using public transportation.

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Hi Larry, great article, but all the data is not in yet! There is a little thing called the great ression going on that is playing heck with the latest data. Do young people drive less these days because they have social media available, or is it because they aren’t employed, have no money, live at their parents house, and don’t yet own their first car? Let’s see where we are in three years when the economy is booming (well 4% growth anyway) and young people have their own place, own an EV and have cash in their pockets!

I’m dad to a 16 year old who has no desire whatsoever to so much as attend driver’s ed as get his license. My kid is happy enough taking public transportation where possible and relying on Mom and Dad where necessary to get where he’s going. Otherwise he connects with his friends via social media and networked gaming. I also wrote about this phenomenon a few months ago on Forbes.com, and concluded that it would take more than smartphone connectivity and Scion-like customization to bring disenchanted young drivers back into the fold. (That is if they ever were in the fold–even at their peak young motorists typically bought used cars, not new ones.) The same goes for throwing good money after creating unobtainable sports cars like the new Viper that serve as little more than poster subjects on car-crazy-kids’ walls. Millennials clearly do not regard cars with the same reverence as did their fore bearers. I’m expecting things will change here–in more ways than just as regard cars–once number one son begins to develop an interest in dating.